#Pragueticallie Perfect

Dear World. Blogs don't do enough to capture everything you are learning and loving about the world. I can't even begin to convey the things I have experienced in just a few words and pictures once a week, and I'm not even sure I've had enough time to sit and process them. These musings will probably just culminate in one giant Thanksgiving post. Also did everyone know that cumulate isn't a word? But here's a small snippet on my recent life. My mind is full. My heart is full. And Europe is continuing to fuel my addictive tendencies for food snobbery and deep gastronomical enjoyment.

Way back when, I signed up for a language exchange through my university. They finally gave me my built-in friend and his name is Ivan. We've met a few times and our planned hour has always turned into two or three. The great part is we usually practice Spanish second so I'm selfishly getting more out of it than he is. He's this funny boy (I'm absolutely editing this the minute he friends me on MySpace) who thinks it's totally normal to talk about that awkward moment we had trying to figure out how many times to kiss each other goodbye last week. He also made fun of me for being THAT American to drink plain black coffee instead of the Spanish way of just an espresso or cafe con leche (with milk). But we're learning a lot and becoming bffs and spend most of the time laughing at each other/my complete incompetence.  

Ivan and people in my classes now have started to jokingly ask me where I traveled over the weekend because of the number of times I've had a answer to that question. Little do they know I have almost every weekend booked between now and January. Oops. I spent Tuesday/Wednesday of last week in Valencia, a city a couple hours south of Barcelona. They, too, have their own language "Valenciano" which is almost more confusing than Catalan mostly because I kept thinking it was Catalan, but it's not. While in Valencia, I stayed with another family on sabbatical from CU. Great to compare sabbatical activities over tapas.

Valencia is really interesting (except where have I been that isn't). It's apparently Spain's third largest city, but totally does not feel like it. Valencia was probably at it's modern peak five or ten years ago when they hosted the American Cup and Formula One race (really unsure what those are but I think one is yachts and the other cars?). Anyways, this means they invested greatly in infrastructure, particularly near the port and really bolstered their tourism economy. Valencia is also known recently for the famous architect Santiago Calatrava's modern constructions. Being an engineer, when people kept saying oh have you seen the Calatrava bridge? I totally thought they meant some type of bridge construction (like suspension...) and had no idea it was refering to a human. Oops again. But he was a fun person to learn about. He designed these crazy bridges and all these weird buildings in La Ciudad de Arte y Ciencias (City of Arts and Sciences) which now house opera, museums, and the aquarium. Although the aquarium is strangely not in the building that is shaped like a breaching humpback whale. Don't really get that. It's funny to asks Valencianos about Calatrava. He's outwardly and formally revered as this brilliant mastermind. But in the past couple of years, his opera house has had major leaking problems (the whole tile right on top of steel with different thermal expansion properties) and a bridge without sufficient stopping sight distance, resulting in major lawsuits and criticism on his engineering skills. Regardless, he's a beautiful artist and Valencia was totally worth the trip to see his work. In addition to all this modern architecture hype, Valencia has a really complex old city with intact giant city towers and pieces of the old walls. They've got the typical cathedral and old European buildings, but some of their streets are truly spectacular to see the mix of eras and architecture styles. Plus Valencianos invented Paella and cook it with rabbit. Bless their beautiful souls I think they're my ancestors.

Valencia also has this heavenly market with a safe section for tourists with clean floors and cooked food and the dream section for real people with raw fish and meat and real life paella pans. Bought one for four euros that's fit for eight people. Probably going to make my first paella for whoever is listed in my most recently updated MySpace top eight. I also drank an obscene amount of horchata. Which is nothing like the weird Mexican stuff we have in the US but is actually just cinammony angel drink made from small seeds that everyone kept telling me are like baby potatoes. Still not really sure how that translates into an ice cream like milkshake but I'll blindly accept it and keep drinking.

I returned to Barcelona for a few hours to change dirty clothes out of my backpack, run to class, and have another language date with Ivan. Then, I found myself headed back to the airport for a weekend in Prague. From taking the train to the airport so many times, I've now learned that all metro musicians are required to buy the same CD with the same three songs on it. They all play some brass instrument and then awkwardly sing the chorus. The best duo was two old men, one of which who played a maraca and a tambourine at the same time.

Then I flew to Prague. I made friends on the flight with this old man because we were smashed together in seats unfit for infants, let alone tall Americans and fat Czechs. Landing in Prague was a small shock coming from 85 degree sunny summer in Barcelona. But I felt positively that I finally had some use for the other half of the clothing I packed coming here. And yes, I did wear ear muffs pragueticallie the whole time in Prague.

I got to my hostel at night and was unfit for socialization before having food and warmth in me so I immediately marched outside and wandered into the first place that had a Czech section on their menu.My hostel was sort of on the other side of the tracks, meaning it was tucked gently away from the surprisingly large crowds of late October tourists and food in my neighborhood was 1/11 the price of food anywhere else. So I pretty much ate nothing all day and binge stuffed myself at night for like six cents. The first night, I had beef goulash and bacon dumplings, which is pretty much on every tourist menu, but nonetheless delicious and perfect for warming the coldest pieces of your body. Then I returned to my hostel to learn how to say "can I caress your buttocks" and "do you have a brother/sister you can introduce to me" in Czech with a Brit named Finn who kept saying "you're a star Allie" in his British accent. Travel really does highlight your weaknesses.

This is the pork knee I ordered. That caused the couple next to me to LOL (laugh out loud, Grandma and Mom), notice I was reading my chronological bible during dinner on a Friday night, and pay for my meal.

My first full day in Prague was a glorious exploration of the land across the river. Prague has some of the most convenient public transportation, and I'm not sure if anyone pays because it's never checked, but I chose to forgo this option and walk to experience the whole of the city. However that meant my early start to avoid tourist crowds was kind of ruined by the fact that it look my curious self much longer to get from one side to the next. The Prague Castle, which to me honestly felt nothing like a castle minus the towering location on top a hillside, is almost a city in itself with a beautiful cathedral that could rival the Sagrada Familia (in appearance and also years to completion: 600), a street of little houses that are now converted into artisan shops and medieval torture displays, and gorgeous views of the vast expanses of red bricked roofs lining the winding Vltava River. I spent hours mesmerized by this place and nursing tredlnik (a warm pastry with cinnamon sugar) only to realize that the second I got back down to the bottom of the hill the skies cleared and the sun was out, so I had to go back and take all my pictures again. I also made it to the famous Baroque church of St. Nicholas, the monastery that has it's own brewery and blueberry beer, and the famous giant metronome on top of the hill.

My second day was spent reminding me that bunions exist and are a curse from Satan himself. But despite the fact that I have now bookmarked a home remedies page on the internet, I found myself enthralled by the continued splendor of this unique city. Every corner is full of another piece of history, architecture, and color. The Jewish neighborhood is still impressively intact, sporting several synagogues, and years of history that escaped total annihilation like in other pieces of the Nazi regime. I'll skip the whole history lesson, but let's just say with Prague being Hitler's favorite city, the whole communist occupation, and the years of cultural and intellectual history that came before, this city is even more beautiful and full of life than the rumors you hear. I hit all the major buildings, museums, bridges, and sites in Prague, but my favorite parts were watching the sun set behind the castle in the evening, tucking myself in a small corner of a pub to try some beer with a name full of only consonants and watch real Czech people eat, and getting lost in the neighborhoods that just have such a story to tell with each colored house.

For the third morning in a row, I was the only person to be up enjoying the coffee prior to 2 pm and had just enough time for a small explore in the neighborhood near my hostel before heading to the airport and back to Barcelona. The one nice thing about Prague not being on the Euro was it forced me to keep to my budget of what I pulled out of the ATM. Otherwise, I might have spent hundreds on street sausage, hot wine, grog (who knew that was a real, non-ogre thing), and dark lager.

You might hear from me again when I've convinced myself to stop lying in bed recovering and start the adventure thing again. But my feet and head are still fighting that one out.

Also did I mention it was fall in Prague? It made me want to cry. I took pictures of leaves for like four hours and panicked.

AL.

Portugrallie Lovesboa

Bom dia. Eu amo Portugal. Este blog é dedicado a Grace Modisett. My beautiful bestie from Colorado flew across the world to spend a week with me for her fall break. First of all she lied to all of her friends when she said she was going to Spain for break. Instead, we did that for like eleven minutes and then learned the meaning of love and beauty and adventure in Portugal.

I picked Grace up from the airport in Barcelona and stopped breathing for ten minutes from sheer panic and excitement. Then I forced her to walk forever with me and see the Sagrada Familia and the Beach and the Arc de Triomf and some tapas when she hadn't slept in five years and couldn't coherently participate in conversation. But that was ok because we had a few moments to rest before getting up at 5 am to go right back to the airport and fly to Portugal. Large lol. 

I found out that I LOVE LISBOA and have added it to the list of Places I Will Move In The Future. Basically everything about Portugal is funny. Our flight was empty but they wouldn't give us free water. We tried to swipe our ticket twice on the metro to share but were thwarted and caused a inappropriate for Sunday morning at 8 scene. We got to our hostel and had the most painful five minutes being checked in by this girl and were scared it would all be weird. But then they fed us cinnamon apple pancakes and we found out our hostel was FULL of Australians and New Zealanders of the best kind.

Our first day we spent walking over 26,000 steps (like 12 miles) in some beautiful Lisboa rain.We
thought we'd be cool and trendy and go to a vintage market. We walked around lost in this sketchy block of rundown buildings unable to enter, until we realized we'd circled the spot several times. So we entered this vintage factory and wandered around totally unable to find the vintage market. Which I'm still unsure if it actually is real. Instead we found this glorious street with Portuguese cantinas and gourmet restaurants. We picked one and they immediately gave us free tapas. We ordered more and got a layered eggplant, honey cheese toast, sweet sausage, and fresh squeezed berry juice. By the end the restaurant was full of large Portugese families and not a single tourist. We visited the famous Jeronimos Monastery, Torre de Belem, and la Catedral Se (which took us three days to realize we'd been to that famous Cathedral). We had our first encounter with Porto at a little wine cellar in our favorite neighborhood. Porto is replacing sangria and margaritas as my favorite alcoholic taste to share. Just think wonderful, delicious, rich, fruit wine. Grace and I were immediately obsessed, and the waiter gave us our first lessons in Portuguese. Although, when I tried to learn how to ask for the check, he instead taught me how to say "Hi Handsome, you are my heart." So thanks, I'll use that interchangeably with the one Thai pick up line I remember ("Easy, Tiger"). Then just when we thought, wow gr8 introduction to Portugal, we found a large group of people folk dancing to the sound of a piercing old woman's voice reminiscent only of Fiddler on the Roof. We finished with dinner at a pizza place where we tried vinho verde, which isn't actually green and ordered gourmet pizzas via iPad and a woman who kept saying "see you soon." She greeted us with hello, but my Ola was so good she thought we were Portuguese.

Then we came home to Andre. Oh my gosh. He's this beautiful angel who only wears stripped shirts, smiles always, and thinks Grace and I are hilarious. He gave us some great Portugal suggestions and made everything about our hostel and Lisboa a thousand times better with his Portuguese English accent. Couldn't find him on Facebook though.

 Monday was trolley day. We took the trolley to Belem, home of pasteis de nata which are baby custard pies that ruin your taste buds forever.  You cover them in cinnamon and powdered sugar and cry when you taste the sort of caramelized vanilla custard creme brulee bottom. They also have delicious bacalhou puffs which are kind of codfish croquetas, so I became obsessed with those too. We discovered the 12E route, which is by far the best one. The trolleys remind me of San Francisco, and speaking of which, Lisboa has a bridge that is exactly the Golden Gate bridge. The added rain and fog and presence of highly trendy food made me sometimes confused where we were. We also adventured on the 28E, which brought us through Barrio Alto. Our 12E friends would just let us stay on and ride the route around and around, so we assumed that was a real thing and tried to do that with the 28E too. But no. Everyone had to get off, watch the trolley pull forward three feet, wait a few more minutes in the pouring rain, and then get back on and pay again.

 
We witnessed the flood from the trolley too. Water flowed down the streets and over the sidewalks and caused a mild panic. We got stuck behind a car accident, because since we're a trolley we couldn't exactly go around. When we were finally able to get off and unfold ourselves from trolley sitting, we stumbled upon this small wine bar with two teeny tables and the sweetest gentleman. I mean seriously. The Portuguese are wonderful. He made us literally the best paninis I've ever had. I tried to ask him how to say you're welcome in Portuguese. He really struggled to understand, because I kept saying it alternately in English and Spanish only to later learn it's "de nada," exactly the same as Spanish. But he understood some English because Grace and I wondered aloud what white Porto tastes like, and were immediately given glasses of white Porto to try. For dessert, Grace tried to purchase the menu item "Slice the Cake -1.50." She was instead given a piece of chocolate cake that she wasn't even allowed to slice.

We exclusively chose our hostel based on their advertisement of free Milkshake Monday. Grace and I looked forward it all day, but when we came home and asked dear Andre when it started, he said it had already finished. But then he told us he saved us some. When I asked what kind of milkshakes they were he said "chocolate, vanilla, strawberry, apple, you know, a bit of everything." They were definitely not milkshakes. It pretty much tasted like liquid salad, but Andre can be forgiven for that.

Monday evening was spent with our hostel friends. I only remember the names of two: Will and Dave, our favorite Australians, the rest we referred to pretty much only by Country of Origin. It was kind of a bring your own wine evening, so obviously Grace and I brought Porto, but we refused to share. We also accidentally convinced Will and Dave to buy red vinho verde based on the fact that we had enjoyed one vinho verde once and you could buy a liter for a lot less. But this one was a weird color and bubbly and tasted like balsamic vinagrette and was a horrible mistake. Anyways, after we finished the Porto, Grace went to go ask Andre about the balsamic vinagrette, and he responded by saying "you've already finished the Porto? Just the two of you?" She relayed this to our foreign friends and they go "Wait you're drinking Porto like wine?" to which we found out Porto is 19 percent alcohol. So that was an interesting fact to learn, and we have no idea how people normally drink Porto if it's not wine, but just add it to the list of things that made Portugal funny.

Tuesday we went to Sintra. In short, Sintra is the place the little girl in Les Mis sings of when she sings Castle On a Cloud. We had a beautiful, unexpected, blue sky day of castles and palaces in Sintra with our New Zealand friend, Storm. Which is ironic. We went to the Pena Palace, built only a couple hundred years ago. You take open aired buses to the top of the hill that make you feel like you're on a safari. The outside is a fairytale and better than anything Disney ever dreamed up. It's painted bright yellow, red, and blue and has domes and spires and arches. The inside is decadently ornate with painted ceilings and walls. Every room is a mural with matching carved furniture and 3D wall paneling. It's beautifully ridiculous and gives outstanding views of the other castles in the city, the beach, and Lisboa. We breaked for lunch and ate at a funny little tavern. I ate codfish soup in a breadbowl. Our waiters were all brothers and couldn't handle it when Grace and I attempted to use Portuguese. We next went to the Moorish Castle, where we got a gorgeous view of the Pena Palace Both of these castles are in the middle of these giant gardens that feel like Narnia. The rocks are covered in old, green moss and the castle in places looks like the Great Wall of China. There are several other castles and palaces in Sintra, most of which we just saw from the outside. But the little town is quaint and interesting, full of teeny, twisty streets, pretty painted houses, and of course lovely Portuguese. Already counting down the days until I can go back.

As soon as we walked into the hostel after Sintra, this sweet old woman grabbed me by the arm and pulled me into the kitchen. There were dishes everywhere and I panicked thinking she was scolding me for someone's mess. BUT NO. This was Mama Odete. She has a baby shopping cart fit for an infant that she pulls around on a leash and fills with her soup ingredients. She comes whenever she wants and when she comes she makes soup. Which she gives away for free and is actually the best soup in the world. She doesn't lie. She told us stories over soup of the history of Portugal and why tea is called tea. I thought it was the most heavenly experience and thoroughly enjoyed her every word. Will said "it's like talking to someone on Tinder." Pretty much she fell in love with us more than anyone else and actually cried when we left.

Grace and I watched a movie in the hostel which had Portuguese subtitles totally unrelated to the movie. One of the hostel staff proceeded to translate the subtitles to us, drowning out the already struggling sound, and he did this for at least fifteen minutes. But that was fine because Andre offered to make us "popcorns" and kept intimating my excited "oh my gosh." Imagine THAT in a Portuguese accent and you'll also never want to leave. Grace and I shared another, unfortunately worse, bottle of Porto to which Andre also said "oh yes, you girls love Porto." And the other guy told me it was motor oil for your body and hoped I was insured. Pretty much I now still have no idea what Porto is and think the hostel thought we were extremely crazy and wild (which we really are not, we just like to laugh and smile as Mama Odete says). 

Wednesday Grace and I were exhausted from previous days of walking, so we did some trolley riding and ice cream eating and general relaxing in Lisboa. We walk back into our hostel that evening to get our bag, and Mama Odete and Andre (<3)  cheered and immediately said they had something for us. They pulled out a bottle of ginja (cherry liquor that if real cheap is bottled Robitussin) and poured us little cups of it. Then Mama Odete protested until he poured her one too, except he only poured her like three millimeters. So we drank cherry liquor with Mama Odete to some song about Porto by a man named Carlos. I couldn't have asked for a better end to Portugal.

My only regret is Grace wouldn't film me singing Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire right next to all of the chestnuts roasting on an open street fire. Should have taken a Self Film. 

Barcelona revived the dream for paradise on the Mediterranean and gave us a beautiful, sunny day on the beach. Except I somehow chose to take Grace to the only beach on the coast with giant rocks in the water. We spent the day wondering why people were struggling so much in the water until we realized that no, we couldn't enter or exit the water gracefully either. We also discovered a few dancing clubs by the beach where they play this weird game where you have to say the exact right things to be allowed in. We had to try a couple times before we gained access. The crowd was a little bit skewed to Russian businessmen, but Grace and I had a glorious time dancing together.

We finished Spain with an absurd amount of food and sangria and an evening with the Magic Fountains of Montjuic. These began with a choir singing B A R C E L O N A ! ! ! in opera, a song that I'm now hunting for to add to my list of Songs That Wake Me In The Morning, which currently only includes Chariots of Fire by the London Philharmonic Symphony. I put Grace on the plane this morning and will be devastated until I see her again, probably when I visit Villanova for Sock Hop 2015.


So Grace, obrigada a million for a most favorite week with you and cheers to Andre.